Saving money on utilities the winter?

[Sophiasmama]

Has anyone bough one of these dryer vents? It allows the warm dryer air to heat the house instead of going to the outside, sorry I'm drawing a blank as to the name of it...always wondered about them.

[amyd]

Has anyone bough one of these dryer vents? It allows the warm dryer air to heat the house instead of going to the outside, sorry I'm drawing a blank as to the name of it...always wondered about them.

We have one, now that we live in a house where the dryer is in the basement it doesn't make as BIG of a difference as when we lived in a house where the laundry room was in the center of the house and everything was all on one level. However it does keep the basement pretty comfortable if you do a couple of loads a day (we do). All in all why waste the warm air by pushing it outside when you can direct it into the house?

We had a 1100sq ft ranch with the laundry room in the center of the house. It was insulated well and until it got really cold the dryer running and heat from cooking was pretty much enough to keep the house comfortable.

[tiff]

I'm in England, we have an open fireplace that we've never used in the 12 years we've lived in this house but after an extremely cold winter last year that we've never seen before we decided to get it up and running this year.

My step Dad has a neighbour who works on building sites and is regularly bringing home bags of wood for us (safe to burn). We are foraging for wood when we go on walks and will top that up with buying some smokless coal for when it gets really cold. We have had the gas central heating on much less due to this free wood so hopefully our gas bill will be much lower this winter.

[MomToTwoBoys]

We usually keep the thermostat down as much as tolerable. But considering that it gets to -40 here (or worse) in the winter, it sits at about 18C during the winter months. We've learned to wear extra layers, use blankets when watching TV and wear slippers on our feet when we get cold.

We put up vapour barrier last weekend and it made a world of difference. Since the bedrooms aren't getting as cold, the heater isn't working as often as it had been before. With an extra sheet on the bed to go with the duvet comforter, it's definitely warmer in the bedroom.

We do have a small draft in the skylight, which is something that will have to be dealt with next year when the snow melts again. But other than that, we had the windows in the front of the house replaced and it's warmer there as well. I think the heat's only been on once since I got home today and I haven't felt the urge to turn the heat up at all. I simply wear a long sweater with a zip-up sweater over it, a cap on my head and thicker socks. I'm usually the coldest one in the house too, but it hasn't bothered me.

We have carpet on every level and I noticed that makes a huge difference. If we leave the doors closed to rooms with only one vent, it overheats that room and the air can't circulate, thus making the rest of the house colder. I would never suggest closing off rooms unless you have a return-air vent and a heating vent in those rooms.

[HappyMama]

We had an open fireplace in a 12 room Victorian, and used a fireplace insert with space heaters. Replaced the insert with another insert ( the old one wasn't working well ) with another older one for 75.00 gentleman needed it gone. I love love love it.

My house was up to 77 degrees in the living room, 72 in the other parts including the upstairs, without space heaters. I am so excited. We are going to heat mainly with wood this yr. so it keeps the house cozy. We do use plastic and heavy velvet curtains in the winter. Try to insulate with heavy curtains, plastic and use space heaters if you have to in the rooms you are in. Good luck.

[waterbaby77]

Our apartment has electric baseboard heat and extremely drafty single pane windows. We have 3 electric baseboard heaters in the living room and one in the bedroom, as well as an electric wall heater in the bathroom.

Our first winter in this apartment, our electric bill was a lot higher than we would like it to be so I called the electric company and the worker there told me to only use one of the heaters in the living room instead of all three. It takes a little longer to heat up the room but the savings are measurable. We don't use the heater in the bedroom or the bathroom at all. We only turn on the living room heater at night when we are home, and we keep it at 65 or below. Of course, we live in Oregon and it has been a pretty mild winter so far. We wear sweaters in the house, and slippers. We have a heavier duvet for the wintertime and if it gets really cold in the bedroom we add a wool blanket.

[Spirit Deer]

When we needed to add central AC to our house, we opted for an air-source heat pump instead. It cools in the summer but it also heats in the winter if the temp is over 25F. It was a couple thousand dollars more than just AC, but in the four years we've had it, it has already more than paid for itself. The power company put us on the off-peak rate. This allows them to shut down our heat or AC for short periods on days when they're experiencing very high usage. In exchange we pay a much lower than normal rate for the heat pump. It has a separate meter the power company put in at no expense to us. The heat pump is probably the best money we've ever spent for home improvement.

I made insulated drapes to cover twelve feet of living room windows and the patio door at night, and that really helped.

We use a small electric oven for many things rather than heating up the big gas oven.

We have a contract with our propane supplier to ensure we do not pay above a certain price for our heating fuel. We don't have to pre-pay, we just pay whenever they fill the tank.

We installed double dog doors and put a thick pad between them at night, and close them off. The cat door is also double and is removable from the patio door. It's insulated on the edge of the door panel and between the sliding doors using pipe wrap, which actually does a very good job. It's removed at night if it's below zero.

Pipe wrap helps conserve heat on hot water pipes.

We turned the thermostat down to 65 this year. Impossible to know how much difference it's making, if any, since the weather is never identical from month to month and season to season. We found turning it down at night and up again in the morning was not cost effective, because that just made the furnace run for hours to heat the house up again. It was easier and more efficient to just keep it at the same temp. We did like sleeping with it cooler at night but it just wasn't worth it.

[HandyMom]

My own personal way of keeping warm at night - I use my hair blowdryer under the covers to warm up the bed while I am in it because I hate getting into a cold bed. Once I'm all warm and toasty, I shut it off and lay it next to the bed just in case I need it again. No electric blanket needed! I turn the thermostat down as low as I can stand it at bedtime and then back up a little once I am dressed and out of bed.

[Libby]

We do have a small draft in the skylight, which is something that will have to be dealt with next year when the snow melts again.

It won't be asthetically pleasing but are you able to plastic wrap the hole in the ceiling where the sky light is? Its still a window and it still lets the heat out, no?

[Shawn V]

My goal is to find efficient ways of using electricity and saving money. I'm tired of my utilities being so high. The utility companies are robbing us and it seems like there is nothing that can be done about it. Unless you spend thousands on solar panels or something. Any one have ideas or resources to guide me so I can maybe help guide others?

[Shawn V]

Here is some pretty good information on using energy efficient. I hope it helps. Ill post more if I find anything!

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficient_energy_use"]Efficient energy use - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

[suzysaver]

Welcome to the plastic bubble. We live in a townhouse apartment with an open lofted ceiling and open staircase. We cover the ceiling area with a double layer of clear plastic and I hang up insulated curtains that cover the stair case and run clear plastic along the bottom of stairs....so all the heat doesn't go straight up stairs. We have a small oil fill radiator style heater that sits in front of the couch turning it on and off as needed. We don't heat upstairs at all and sleep with an electric blanket. I cover all the windows in plastic and hang a draft blanket inside the entry hall. I have a breaker box in the kitchen (very handy) I turn all switches off that are not needed, including the hot water heater during the day time...I switch it on before going to bed, so hubby has a hot shower in morning and then I get up and switch it off. In the evenings I wear a turtleneck sweater, a thermal top and bottom with a forever lazy suit over all. Hubby nows to wear his thermals and get his couch blanket. Extra chilly nights I sip hot tea.

[bent]

thank for this topic
I have two response first is from my mom's house (which if I remember correctly is about 90yrs old) since she is elderly and on disability the local community action did the following for her (grant money is lovely). blew insulation into her attic, and in all exterior walls (they drilled a small hole then caulked it closed), used roll insulation underneath her house (in between the big wood pieces -I know they have a name it just escapes me now), put 5 or 7 mil black plastic down underneath her house-(old house raised on brick pylons), replaced/repaired three cracked window panes, caulked around the top/bottom of each wall (she has the 6" baseboard), they sealed iwth insulation abound both her window units (large one in l/r, tiny one in her bdrm), moved her water heater in the basement and vented it differently, covered the gap under the entrance door), caulked around all the windows inside and out (the fifth yr she lived there CA put storm windows on all the old windows-half the house had new windows other half had originals), two new gas heaters (digital thermostat's) to replace her wall units (5 brick type), vented the new stove hood they built, fixed a sagging spot in her spare room (turns out it was a cast iron stove pipe- the guy who discovered it was well pleased with mom gave it to him maybe that's why they stayed an extra day), put new doors on the back two rooms- they only had plywood cut to size. and a new back door. she called when she got her first gas bill of the winter (not that it's ever much- she is very hot natured -when we visit for Xmas we dress warm and keep our coats on... not this yr). she also cooks with gas but I estimated that her gas used for heating ran her about $15.
now what I do to combat high utilites:
luckily the apt where I live has storm windows/doors with pretty good seals but I augment with a rolled up towel between the outside and inside door, I can't do any improvement (like using spray insulation under the baseboards where 1'' spaces are noticed), I have a central unit that I set to 55 degree (someone tell me the keys to make degree symbol ), then I shut it off at the fuse box-(we had it on twice this past winter season both times one/all of us got sinus infections-the last time dh was visiting and turned it on so i know it wasn't an accident of it automatically turned on... the sound of it 'kicking on' woke me so I got up and turned it off... duh! WE GET SICK. so only I suffered from that time-my room had the vent opened). I keep ds/dd's vents closed, I have two 'curtains' (king size flat sheet in a nice pattern bought from ts for .99) one on the entry to the kitchen and one to the hall entry. we bundle up, a cpl layers of clothes, lap blankets, and I would turn on the oven to heat the kit/lr-which run together if it got too cold, I never replaced the microwave when it died, I keep dryer unplugged and turned off at the fusebox-linedry clothes, same with washer only flip on when I do laundry. have power/surger protectors on all computer, tv, and they get turned off at night so no phantom power usage. we rarely use lights during the day (ds does when he schools), I open the windows during sunny days to raise temp- I have a gas water heater so that's not an issue. I also keep a running tally of my mthly usage of power (still havent gotten into the daily power reading- but last mth my usage was 7kwh per day down from 10 the previous mth, and down 7 from this time last yr.) I'm soon going to be loosing a 21 cu ft refrigerator- currently not keeping things frozen- its used mostly to keep my 'dry goods' in while I make room in my small freezer (i freeze my flour meal for 48 hrs before storing in pantry to kill any bugs- also do the same with my mac n cheese- due to the great pantry loss of 2009 due to mealy bugs, pasta also is kept frozen beans for a wk-no scientific reason for this other than I forget sometimes to take them out on time). also something we've taken to doing is sipping on hot lemon water, flavored teas, coffee-but my last cup made me sick so i've given it up and lots of soups to help heat us up.

[homemaker66]

We started to use the outdoor solar light for night lights inside the house. I took the stakes off and turn them upside down at night so the light will stay on. I put them throughout the house so we don't have to keep turning on/off lights for example in the bathroom. This is a lot safer then burning candles which I love to do.